Quad core smartphones are being heralded as the next generation of mobile power, with Nvidia's Tegra 3 leading the quad-cord revolution. In theory, the Tegra 3 and other quad-core devices should give you much more parallel processing capabilities than dual-core chips, but Texas Instruments isn't ready to give up on their dual-core processors just yet.

In the video above, the company demonstrates two tablets, one powered by their new highly optimized Cortex-A15 dual-core processor and the other powered by a Cortex A9 which is almost certainly the Tegra 3, running a series of page loading tests with the stock Android 4.0 browser. In order to also test parallel processing, the devices are also downloading video and playing mp3 music at the same time.

If you watch the above video, you will find that the TI's chip handily outperforms the Tegra 3, taking only 95 seconds to complete the benchmark and making the Cortex A9/Tegra 3 tablet's 201 seconds seem painfully slow. Obviously, this is still a promotional video released by TI to highlight its chip's performance, but the results are nevertheless quite impressive.

We don't know yet exactly how TI's processor achieved such good results, but it is likely a combination of the new Cortex-A15 architecture and special optimization for Android 4.0. Whatever it is, though, we should get more information at the quickly approaching Mobile World Congress, and hopefully a better idea of how the processor performs in daily use as well.

About the Author

Aaron Orquia is an associate editor at Pocketables. He has been using Android and Linux since he bought his first computer years ago, and his interest in technology, software, and tweaking both to work just right has only grown stronger since then. His current gadgets include a OnePlus One, a Pebble smartwatch, and an Acer C720 Chromebook.